


it started out with a kiss (how did it end up like this)

by portraitofemmy



Series: open up your eager eyes [1]
Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Season/Series 01, Alternate Universe, Clubbing, Dirty Talk, Eliot Waugh's Canonically Huge Dick, Friends to Lovers, Hand Jobs, M/M, Messy Millenials Being Messy, No Beast AU, alcohol & drug use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-09
Updated: 2019-12-09
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:00:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21737971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/portraitofemmy/pseuds/portraitofemmy
Summary: There's no beasts, no gods, no monsters. Just magical grad-school and all the messy human things that come with it. So when Eliot, barely holding it together after heartbreak, kisses Quentin in a drunken stupor, it feels like the end of the world.But is it?
Relationships: Margo Hanson & Eliot Waugh, Quentin Coldwater/Eliot Waugh
Series: open up your eager eyes [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1989295
Comments: 80
Kudos: 708





	it started out with a kiss (how did it end up like this)

**Author's Note:**

> This was so much fun to write, it's a very different take on their relationship then I usually play with, which turned out to be very refreshing. I hope it's as much fun to read as it was to work on!
> 
> Shout out to [saltandpepperbox](https://saltandpepperbox.tumblr.com/) for beta read. You're awesome!

It starts with a kiss. 

Quentin's mouth soft under his, half-open with surprise or laughter, but _soft_. So soft, and so sweet, and a little sharp with whiskey on his lips. A soft hitch of a breath and the touch of tongue to tongue, Quentin's skin soft as velvet under his hands, Quentin's fluttery hands landing on his chest. 

Or maybe it starts with a drink.

A whole bottle of wine in, Quentin finds him by the fire in the common room, and he's only not crying because he hasn't cried for weeks– or maybe because he can't feel his face, exactly, but that's maybe the little green pill he took earlier, or the wine, or the whiskey he's drinking now. He's not entirely sure he's real anymore, but Quentin's hand on his shoulder feels real. Bambi's off dealing with the Margolem and Quentin's the only one here who Eliot trusts. 

"Have a drink with me, Q?" Eliot asks, head lulling towards Q. How has he never noticed how it is to the last sound of Quentin's nickname? He says it again and drags out the _ooooooo_ sound, as Quentin settles onto the arm of his chair.

"Tell you what," Quentin says, and there's a pitch to his voice Eliot doesn't recognize. He's usually pretty good at reading Quentin's moods, it's not exactly _hard_. Not when the sweet little nerd wears his bleeding heart on his sleeve, every single day of his life. But there's something in Quentin's voice he can't recognize, soft and– protective? Worried? No, that can't be right. Quentin reaches out and takes the glass out of Eliot's hand, which had been holding it precariously on his knee. "How about I finish your drink, and then we put you to bed, huh?"

Except maybe it starts before that, with a surprise day off.

Eliot's class was cancelled due to someone accidentally giving a desk consciousness in the lab building. Apparently decades of having gum stuck to and scraped off of you left you pretty fucking pissed, because the desk had gone on a rampage, and most of the faculty were occupied trying to contain and reverse the problem. And, well, Margo was off to Ibiza and Quentin was following along after Alice like the answer to the universe was in her panties and if he just carried enough of her books or brought her enough coffee she might let him learn it.

Luckily, Eliot didn't have to put up with that hetero nonsense, because he had a boyfriend. A boyfriend in New York, and a free afternoon with nothing better to do than surprise Mike with a home cooked meal in his apartment when he got off from work.

Ha.

Joke's on Eliot, of course, because turns out Mike was already home.

Turned out Mike was home because he'd scheduled a nooner with a fit guy Eliot's never seen before, but sees a lot of very quickly. Like, dark-head-to-bare-ass a lot of. 

There'd been a lot of yelling. 

It wasn't until the windows start to shake and Eliot realizes that he's very rapidly losing control of the simmer of power under his skin, the power that _killed people_ whether he wanted it to or not, that he manages to drag himself out of the apartment. In the middle of the fight, with Mike calling after him, a shout of: " _Eliot!_ Talk to me!"

Fuck that. 

He'd kept himself together long enough to get back through the portal to Brakebills and into the woods away from any other people, before telekinesis _exploded_ out of him. Rocks flew into tree trunks, branches shredded and crumpled and turned to splinters, gouges of invisible force slash in the Earth as Eliot crumples to his knees. 

Shit kept exploding around him for a little while, but turns out that's not actually him, it's Margo. That's what you get for unprotected spellwork.

So a couple weeks later Eliot's pretty drunk and kind of high, and Quentin's getting him back into his room, tucked under his arm like the perfect little support pillar he is. His hands are on Eliot's hips, and then he's falling onto the bed with Eliot, tumbling down with a laugh as Eliot catches onto his shoulder as he falls. 

He's laughing, or surprised, mouth open when Eliot kisses him.

His hands land solidly on Eliot's chest, and there's just a second where they curl into the material of Eliot vest, and then they're flattening out. Pushing, gently, Eliot away from him.

Eliot's stomach roils, and suddenly he feels like he might throw up. He threw up yesterday. Quentin had helped him, held him steady so he didn't pitch face-first into the bush full of his own sick. Quentin has been the only person who's even bothered to give a shit at _all,_ besides– but even Margo has no idea what to do with him right now. Keeps trying to make him _talk shit on Mike,_ doesn't get that Eliot can't. 

Quentin's the only one who's giving Eliot space to be messy, like he gets that it's impossible to stop hurting, and Eliot just– 

"It's okay," Quentin's saying, hand steady on Eliot's chest, and it might be comforting if it wasn't so clearly a barrier, keeping Eliot at bay. Because Quentin doesn't even _like_ boys as far as Eliot can tell, and listen, okay, that's never exactly stopped Eliot before. He's taken advantage of the 'a mouth is a mouth' argument to get what he wants more than once. But Quentin is also one of the only people who gives a shit, and Eliot really is going to throw up.

Luckily he's started sleeping with a trashcan near the bed, so all he has to do is roll.

"Jesus, Eliot," Quentin mutters, but his hand is rubbing between Eliot's shoulder blades. Quentin, who is the only person who gives a shit, finds water somewhere to rinse out his mouth, gets him curled up on his side, pets Eliot's loose hair back off his damp forehead.

"I can't do this to Alice," Quentin says softly, fingers carding thorough Eliot's hair, and Eliot squeezes his eyes shut. He really can't listen to how much Quentin loves his girlfriend right now. "You get that, right? I can't– do to her what Mike did to you, when it hurt you this much. And you're drunk, and _fucked up_ and– El. I can't do that to either of you. You get that, right?"

"Yeah. I just–" Eliot swallows, throat clicking, and he still tastes bile, but Quentin's still touching him, hand falling on to Eliot's chest as he rolls onto his back. Looking at him with that look on his face. "Sorry."

"It's okay," Quentin repeats, then, "I think you should probably sleep on your side tonight."

And that's about the last thing Eliot registers before he passes out.

__

(If you asked Quentin, he might say:

It starts with a drinking game.

Margo'd come back from Ibiza to find Eliot, well– passed out face down on the couch, frankly, but Quentin had been sitting next to him on the floor, so he was sure Eliot was still breathing. He kept checking. "Mike cheated on him," Quentin had said, quietly, to Margo's inquiring noise. Eliot, if he was aware of being talked about, did not respond.

"I knew he was a piece of shit," Margo crowed, and she sounded... way too delighted, honestly, for how miserable Eliot's been for the last week. But she hasn't been here to see that, so– he can't really hold it against her.

Margo had declared a celebration, insisting that what Eliot really needed was to see how much better off he was. Quentin, privately, thought what Eliot really needed was someone to tell him that he didn't deserve to be treated like shit by someone he cared about. What he probably needed was proof that he wasn't alone. But, well, Margo knew Eliot better than Quentin did. Maybe a celebration would be the only kind of proof Eliot understood. God knows whatever Quentin had been trying to do in the last week wasn't working.

He still felt like a drinking game might be a bad idea, given how Eliot had more or less been drunk for the whole of the last week, but. Margo knew Eliot better than him, and also Alice had sat down next to Quentin with a little smile and that look on her face like she wasn't sure what to do with his attention but liked it, and well. She’s been kind of hot and cold recently, but if she’s in a mood to be coupley, he’s not going to fight it. Margo would look after Eliot. 

So they played _never have I ever,_ which Quentin hates, because he's never fucking done anything ever. 

"Never have I ever sucked a dick in a Denny's parking lot," Eliot says neatly, and Quentin sighs, three fingers still held, resolutely, up.

"Oh, fuck you, bitch," Margo replies, and does a shot, down to one finger. One of the other 2nd years playing with them also drinks, which seems surprising given how specific and pointed that had clearly been. Denny's parking lots: more exciting than Quentin had been led to believe. 

"Love you, bitch," Eliot trills back, and Quentin, sitting between him and Alice, sways to bump his shoulder against Eliot's. It gets him a grin, and that swoopy feeling in his stomach he's gotten since the first time Eliot ever smiled at him is still there, warm and familiar. _You're my best friend_ , Quentin thinks, and it makes a pang of guilt shoot around his chest, giving Julia's title to someone else, but. They were growing apart anyway, what with being in different disciplines, and she’d gotten weird about Alice after Brakebills South. Eliot was _here_. Eliot was kinder to him than anyone had ever been before, and leaned on Quentin like he trusted him. Like he trusted that Quentin could actually support them both. 

"Your turn, Margo," Kady says, from the other side of the circle where she's laying on Penny. Quentin doesn't know why Penny's here. He's not playing, he's just drinking their booze. And probably also sleeping with Kady, that's probably why he's here.

"Never have I ever faked an orgasm," Margo says smugly, leaning back on her hand. There's a general out cry of protests and ribbing, and Quentin's as ready to laugh along as the next person except–

He can see Alice glancing at him out of the corner of his eye. She doesn't put a finger down, but she looks– pinched, uncomfortable, and his heart drops.

_What?_

Or he might say it starts a few weeks earlier with a stack of books.

One stack of books too many, apparently, which he tries to pick up and carry for Alice as she moves from one section of the Brakebills library to the other. 

"I can _carry my own books_ , Quentin," she'd snapped, and that lead-hard feeling of discomfort settles into his stomach. "It's 2016, women don't need you to _carry shit_ for us."

"I was just–" _trying to be nice?_ Fuck, he'd just wanted to make her smile, it felt like forever since she'd smiled at him.

"Why are you even _here_? I told you I was going to be working the whole time." Her mouth is a sharp downturned line, and he wants to make her smile, he just wanted her to be _happy_ to see him. 

"I haven't seen you in–"

"5 hours? We live in the same house." She's prickly, but he'd known that about her, hadn't he? Hadn't he liked her prickles? He must have. He liked being the thing that smoothed out her ruffles, liked the shy little way she'd smiled at him across the hallway at Brakebills South. 

"Living in the same house isn't the same as spending time together," Quentin points out, because he sees Margo and Eliot in The Cottage more than he sees her.

Her nostrils flare, and she looks back at her book, breathing out "You're so needy," under her breath. And well. Not the first time he's heard that in his life.

Or maybe it starts like this:

Quentin walks across a sea of green grass towards a colonial style brick building, sweating through his winter jacket in the warmth of the summer sunlight which seems to have– manifested out of nowhere. There's a man lounging on a sign bearing the name of a university Quentin's never heard of before, long, _long_ legs stretched out and a cigarette dangling lazily from his fingertips.

"Quentin Coldwater?" he asks, voice rich and deep like chocolate, and something in Quentin's chest sits up and goes _oh, there you are_.)

__

Eliot wakes up alone the next morning.

Which isn’t, really, entirely noteworthy, because he’s spent the last couple weeks waking up alone. But he remembers, vaguely, small flashes, snippets of someone– small warm body under his arm, a shy smile... soft lips, soft skin, soft, soft, _soft– soft long hair_.

Fuck. Q.

 _Fuck_.

So Eliot does what he always does when he makes bad decisions with his dick: take a couple pills, and run the fuck away. 

Of course, it is notably harder to run away from someone you share a house with. It’s been a while since he made any dick-lead bad decisions with any physical kids, mostly because the only one of any interest at all in this year’s surviving crop of newbies is, well– Quentin. 

So it may be that running away looks a lot more like hiding, in this instance. 

Which is undignified as hell, honestly, he’s riding out a trip on the roof of the administration building and thank fuck no one can see him, flat on his back as colors dance in front of his eyes. He still feels a little queasy, honestly, the pill might have also been a bad idea. 

His brain skips and dances between– fractured images, blue eyes fade into wide brown, tight blonde curls into a soft wave of light brown, Mike’s frame in his arms, short but fit with muscle, Quentin against his side, nerd-thin but deceptively solid.

 _I need to fuck a tall black guy_ , he thinks, rolling over on to his side and squeezing his eyes shut against the onslaught of images. _No more short white guys, this is getting out of hand._

He misses Mike.

Except– what he misses is... the attention, the regard, the feeling of being _seen_ and appreciated, like he was– special? Had Mike really, _really_ given him that? It had felt like it, at first. 

Quentin has. Given him that.

Quentin’s always looked at him like he can’t quite believe Eliot’s got any attention left for him, blossoms when he gets it. It was good for the ego, and Quentin was just so– _cute_ , in his awkward little nerd way. He was so excited to talk about things, _so_ excited about magic. Quentin solidly in his space, Quentin doggedly following him around as he tried to drink himself out of a broken heart, Quentin taking up the mantle in Margo’s absence and valiantly putting up a good show of best-friend-ship. His version of it was different then Margo’s, but– good. Eliot can’t remember the last time he was friends with another guy like this, men either wanted to get fucked by him or were scared of him. Or both. Frequently both.

Except– Quentin was straight.

Right? 

God, it felt good to kiss him.

But he’d pushed Eliot away. Said... something, Eliot can’t remember what. Something about Alice. 

Alice, his _girlfriend_. 

The queasy feeling comes back, and Eliot resolves to keep hiding a little bit longer.

Except hiding from Margo never really works. He’s never really _wanted_ to hide from Margo before, so he’s not very good at it, only manages it for a couple of days. Of course, it doesn’t help that he doesn’t _actually_ want to hide from her, he just doesn’t want to deal with her reminding him that she was right about Mike all along. He really doesn’t want her to ask her what’s up with him now.

But he’s– he’s– careening out of control, he really is, he can feel it. He feels unhinged in a way that’s usually dangerous, and not just for him. He’s going to– he’s going to end up _hurting_ someone, if he doesn’t get his _shit_ together, and he has absolutely no idea how to do that. Margo’s good at handling shit. Maybe she can handle his shit.

So he slips into her room late at night, through the wards that dance over his skin and let him in, the shiver of magical proof that he’s always welcome in her space.

“Bambi?” he asks, and Margo just hums, twitching the corner of the blanket in invitation. It’s enough, for him to strip down to boxers and an undershirt and crawl into bed next to her, curl up like they’re little kids at a sleepover.

“You done hiding from me now?” she asks, bitchy, and he sighs, offers a soft _yeah_ of agreement. “Good. I know it’s shitty that I wasn’t here, but I _tried_ , okay? Then you cocked out on me.”

“I know,” he gets out, and god, had he hurt her too? He hadn’t even _noticed_. God, what is happening to him? “Bambi, I– I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“When do we ever?” she asks, rolling over so he can see her face in the dark. “You’re Eliot fucking Waugh. The universe does what you tell it to.”

It’s a nice idea. Would be nicer if it was even a little bit true. “I don’t think it works that way.”

“Hey,” Margo says, and he can barely see her face in the dark, but she looks. Like she’s looking through him, somehow. Like whatever Eliot’s trying to show her is just not connecting. “I know this sucked, it’s _fucked up_ that he would do this to you, but you’re so much better than him. It’s _his_ fucking loss. And I hate seeing you like this. I need you to get yourself to full fabulous again, okay? This is a two-bitch production.”

“What if I can’t?” he asks, quiet and– god, isn’t that what he’s so scared of? What if he’ll never, ever be able to be functional again? What if he never was?

“Of course you can,” Margo says, brows drawing together. “Eliot, he’s just a boy. There’ll be others. I can get you another tomorrow.”

And that’s the thing, isn’t it? Margo’s never going to understand this, not really. “Yeah,” he sighs, and lets his eyes slide closed, holds the small curve of her body in his arms. It’s not quite right, but it’s a hell of a lot better than sleeping alone.

––

“We’re going to the city tonight,” Margo announces after class a few days later, sweeping into her room where Eliot’s taken shelter, now that she’s not one of the people he’s hiding from anymore. Plus, her bed is near a window, so he can smoke rakishly out it without worrying about burning the fucking house down. “I promised you I’d get you a boy, didn’t I?”

“There are boys here,” Eliot grumbles, because well. He hasn’t been back into the city since the break-up.

“Barely,” Margo huffs, pulling dresses out of her closet and throwing them towards the bed. A glittery corset lands on his calf, and he toes it off delicately. “Besides, this isn’t just about you. It’s not even mostly about you. We’re taking Quentin out, since he and Alice broke up.”

Eliot’s heart does something funny and complicated where it tries to take flight, forgetting that it’s broken and doesn’t work right. It kind of hurts. Physically. “Quentin and Alice broke up? When? Why?”

Margo looks at him like he’s grown a new head. “They’ve been fighting for like, _weeks_. I know you’re in your feelings, but– how did you miss _that_?”

Eliot genuinely has no idea, besides that he’s been kind of doggedly avoiding Quentin for the last four days. “Q never said– I thought they were happy.”

Margo snorts. “Well, Quentin _is_ kind of known for having his head up his own twat, but even he’s not going to come to you with his relationship problems when you’re one bottle of tequila away from a nervous breakdown.”

“Thanks for sugar coating it,” he sighs, and taps out another cigarette. 

“Honey, we both know you don’t come to me for sugar,” she says sweetly, all teeth, and for the first time in days, the knot of misery in Eliot’s chest loosens a little. It’s nice to be with her. “Honestly I’m surprised they lasted this long. Mayakovsky’s little setups almost never last past winter break.”

“He liked her before that,” Eliot says, because that much had been obvious. If it hadn’t been so obvious, Eliot might have been a little more aggressive in his own interest. But, well. Question answered, on that front. Except... Eliot had kissed him, and then he and his girlfriend broke up. That was a definite sequence of events that had definitely happened. Not that Margo knew that, not unless Quentin had told her, and if he had– this whole conversation would be going differently. Still. 

Still.

“Anyway, it’ll be good for both of you to go out,” Margo says, wheeling around holding a little black leather dress and holding out at him. “Too slutty for a Tuesday?”

“Never, Bambi.” 

Eliot spends longer on his face and hair than he has in almost a month. It's a valiant effort in ‘fake it ‘til you make it’, but he tells himself it's what Margo deserves. She looks beautiful and dangerous in her leather dress, which does truly amazing things for her legs from an aesthetic standpoint, hair in a straightened high pony and smokey eye. If she can wax her legs at 5pm on a Tuesday, Eliot can clean up his fucking eyebrows. 

He ends up with an open collared shirt and a jacket, and spends the entire time he's molding his hair into touchably soft waves pointedly not imagining being touched by anyone in particular. _The best you can hope for is an anonymous blowjob in a bathroom stall_ , he reminds himself, and tries really hard to cut the thought off there. Avoids, with effort, thoughts of _worth_ and _what you deserve._

What he deserves is to look good on Margo's arm, turn heads and be beautifully unobtainable. He can manage that. 

There's a small group clustered in the common room by the door, Penny and Kady both looking their own bohemian version of weeknight sexy, and Quentin. Who honestly mostly just looks like Quentin, though he'd clearly at least bothered to put on his least worn pair of jeans and isn't wearing a hoodie.

"I didn't realize we were taking the whole crew," Eliot says lightly, and Kady gives him a level look. 

"I want to get off campus as much as you do, asshole," she drawls, and he thinks she probably wants to get off campus a good deal more than he does, actually, but whatever. Better to not engage. 

Quentin looks as uncomfortable as Eliot would have predicted, and Eliot wonders briefly what Margo threatened him with to get him to agree to this. But then he's falling into step by Eliot's side, giving him a cautious smile, and Eliot kind of forgets much beyond that fact that his mouth has been on that mouth. 

“I haven’t been off campus since the last time I went to visit my dad,” Quentin admits, and well. As far as boner killers go, that is a pretty successful one.

“How’s he doing?” Eliot asks, because it’s not like he _forgot_ Quentin’s dad is dying, except he kind of forgot Quentin’s dad is dying.

“Well, I mean. It’s brain cancer, it’s kind of like– brain cancer. He’s forgetting stuff. Has a lot of headaches.” Quentin shrugs, flexing his hands like he wants to shove them in the pockets of a hoodie but can’t because he’s not wearing a hoodie. “I think we’re just doing... symptom management, at this point.”

That is incomprehensibly shitty, and not something Eliot has a lot to say in comfort for, so he just. Loops his arm around Quentin’s shoulder, and hopes this is still okay. God, please let this still be okay. But Quentin just sways into Eliot’s touch the way he has since they met, easily willing to let Eliot being affectionate towards him and _thank Christ,_ at least he didn’t break this. At least he can still– offer comfort in this way.

The club Margo picked was probably a fairly safe bet, in that if Quentin was likely to have fun at _any_ club, it would probably be this one. If Eliot had been planning an outing with Quentin in mind, he probably would have gone for a barcade, but at least this place seems to favor mid-2000s pop hits over house music or dubstep. 

Penny and Kady disappear within a couple songs, which Eliot could have seen coming. Margo’s in the club for about 15 minutes before she’s got 5 guys vying for her attention with varying levels of politeness, which Eliot could also see coming. Quentin immediately starts propping up the bar, and really Eliot should check and see if his discipline has changed to clarvoyance at some point, because he’s got fucking _foresight_ about how this whole evening is going to play out. Margo’s going pick one of those boys and chew on him lightly until it’s time to head back to campus, and then disappear back behind the wards without giving him her number. Eliot himself going to drink until he’s too drunk to avoid making stupid decisions and let someone blow him in the bathroom if he can still get it up, and throw up on the way home. Quentin’s going to get increasingly unhappy as the night goes on until one of them collects him to head back. 

The path is so clear, and it feels so inevitable, and Eliot’s pretty much resigned himself to it, motioning to the bartender over to ask for like... four fingers of whiskey, when the music changes to a familiar set of opening bars, and _literally_ everyone in the club sparks to life with energy.

 _Coming out of my cage I’ve been doing just fine, gotta gotta be down because I want it all. Started out with a kiss how did it end up like this, it was only a kiss, it was only a kiss_. 

Eliot has just long enough to feel like the universe is out to fuck him, personally, before he registers a laugh at his side and focuses in on Quentin, who’s– actually smiling, like, wide enough to just see a little bit of his teeth. And bouncing a little. And honestly, Quentin’s smiles are just too fucking rare to waste on _maudlin premonition_. Not if he’s willing to let Eliot tug him away from the bar by his wrist and be dragged out into the floor.

And, okay, calling it ‘dancing’ would be really over-generous, they’re literally just bouncing up and down and shouting the words at each other with every other half-drunk young millennial in the club. But it’s freeing, somehow, to just– jump and shout and watch Quentin’s face scrunch up as he jumps and shouts, his hair bouncing wildly around his head. Eliot feels young, for a moment, feels more like a 13-year-old than he had at 13, bouncing and dancing with a cute boy with a cute smile. Just for a moment, three solid minutes of _Mr. Brightside_ , Eliot forgets to be scared. 

The music shifts to a stomping rhythm, and they bounce to a stop as Gwen Stefani reminds them that she ain’t no holla back girl. There’s a second of awkwardness, then Quentin’s moving towards him, going up on his toes so he can speak into Eliot’s ear.

"Do you want a smoke? I need some air," Quentin says, standing close enough that Eliot can feel his breath against his cheek just to be heard over the loud music. 

He nods, and follows gamely as Quentin leads the way out of the club. There's a cluster of smokers in the alley, and Quentin leans against the wall, ignoring them as he taps two out of his pack, handing one to Eliot. They're his shitty menthols, but hey. Nicotine is nicotine, and Eliot left his cigarette case in his jacket at the coat check. He snaps the end to life, and holds it out to Q to light off of, trusting that everyone else in the alley is too preoccupied to notice the little display of magic.

"So here we are," Eliot says, leaning rakishly back against the wall and desperately trying to affect disinterest, like his heart isn't doing twelve different painful things in his chest. "Just a couple of single men."

"My normal state of being," Quentin says dryly, and his arm presses warmly into Eliot's as he leans back against the wall. "Yours too, according to Margo."

There's an implied difference there, like Eliot would be single by choice while Quentin is by lack of appeal. It's not entirely fair to either of them, Eliot thinks, but he hums anyway, around the end of his cigarette. "So who dumped who?" he asks, looking lazily around the street, aware of every inch of the performance he's giving right now. He trails a casual glance over at Quentin, and finds himself stuck in the way Quentin is looking at him. Like he can see the performance for what it is, too. It's disconcerting, leaves Eliot off balance and caught on the back foot. 

"It was a mutual thing, mostly," Quentin admits, face scrunching up, wrinkling his fucking cute little nose. "It wasn't really working. And it was either... hold on and end up hating each other, or give it up and maybe, some day, be able to be friends. I don't want to hate her, and I definitely don't need her hating me, so."

He shrugs, and there's a little downward tug to his mouth. Mutual or not, he's clearly still processing everything. "I'm sorry," Eliot says after beat, looking away, giving Quentin a moment of privacy even in this most public of settings. 

He can feel that searching, too-knowing gaze is on him. "Are you?" Quentin asks quietly, curiously, and Eliot's stomach wriggles a little. He tells it to calm the fuck down, and takes another drag. 

"Fuck, Q, if you feel even a fraction of how shitty I've felt for the last couple of weeks, then yeah, I really am." Eliot breathes smoke through his nose, feels the icy burn of Quentin's stupid shitty menthols, feels the weight of Quentin's eyes on him. 

"Did you love him?" Quentin asks, quietly, a little bit of hesitation in his voice, but he's leaning back into Eliot side, the warmth and weight of him so fucking– precious.

So maybe, in the end, it starts with honesty.

"I really wanted too," Eliot admits, and it's somehow easier to say than he would have ever imagined. "I really wanted to love him, Q. I wanted him to love me so badly. But... No. I wasn't there yet. It just– felt like he saw me. And wanted me anyway."

"I see you." Eliot's eyes snap over to him, but Quentin’s just looking at him with that intense, wide-eyed look he gets when he's really focused in on something. And– He does, doesn't he? Q's always seen him, because Eliot's always let him. He had known Q barely a week before he was spilling his own deep dark secret in the hope that it might convince Quentin he wasn't alone. It had worked, but the unexpected consequence of it was suddenly Eliot wasn't alone either. Because Quentin looked back at him and _saw_.

Then, because Quentin is _so_ fucking brave, the bravest person Eliot’s ever known, he’s twisting around off the wall, pushing up on his toes to press a warm kiss against Eliot’s mouth. 

It’s a brief, fleeting thing, Eliot barely has time to register the feeling, then Quentin’s back in his own space, looking determined but a little sheepish. The music from the club thuds dully in the background, and Eliot’s stupid broken heart is trying so, so hard to keep itself together. _Kiss him, kiss him, kiss him_ it beats in his chest, and Eliot’s not sure if he’s ever been more scared of anything in his life than he is of the way Quentin’s looking at him right now.

He could run away.

Or he could flick the end of his cigarette to the cold cement and step forward, cup the side of Quentin’s neck in his palm, feel the softness of his skin, the warmth of him, back him up against the wall and kiss him. 

It’s nothing like kissing Mike.

It’s– honestly, it’s better. Eliot appreciates a little bit of push-pull occasionally, but Quentin just sighs and _melts_ , and that– that lights a fire in Eliot's belly. He lets Eliot lead the kiss thoughtlessly, easily, his own hands landing on Eliot’s chest and sliding down to pull him in close. It’s better because it’s _Q_ , and when Eliot pulls back to catch his breath, he’s met with dimples and wide brown eyes, cute ski-slope nose running along his jaw as Quentin pushes up on his toes again, nuzzling like an affectionate cat.

He swallows, hand still cupping the back of Quentin’s head, trailing his thumb across the soft skin under his ear. “I’m a mess, Q,” is what he gets out, and it’s maybe what he’d been trying to say to Margo the other night. Maybe Quentin will actually understand. “My life doesn’t work, and I’ve never been able to fix that. I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to stop being broken.”

 _I see you_ , Quentin had said, and it feels like it, now. Eliot feels seen, here in the wash of neon light in this dingy alley outside a club. What a romantic setting. Jesus. “I’m kind of a mess too,” Quentin points out, and well. It’s true, he is, Eliot knows that about him. Has known that about him since the day they met. “But I’m pretty good at handling other people’s messes. It’s easier than handling my own. So maybe I can help?”

Eliot laughs, dropping his forehead down onto Quentin’s and it’s only a little strangled. “Did you break up with your girlfriend because I kissed you?” he asks, because it seems like maybe that’s the kind of thing he should know before they settle into something bigger than a handie or a blowjob. And _let me handle your mess_ definitely sounds bigger than that.

“It– may have been a factor,” Quentin admits, voice a little squeaky, and he clears his throat while Eliot laughs again. “But no, that wasn’t why. I’m not sure listing off all the reasons why I was a bad boyfriend to her is a great way to start this, but um– she says I’m needy and apparently I’m bad at making her come and–”

“Quentin,” Eliot cuts him off, and fuck, he’s still laughing, not just a wry chuckle, but like... actual happy laughter. When was the last time he laughed? “You’re definitely needy, but I like that about you.”

Quentin’s face flushes, which is incredibly interesting. Eliot brushes his fingers against the tinge of red, feels Quentin’s skin warm under his hand. “I– yeah. I mean. Mostly, I just– Eliot, I really like you. I _really_ like spending time with you. And I know that it’s going to be complicated and I know you might still miss Mike, or– or– be hurt by that. But you’re my _best friend_ , and you’re _so hot_ and I just– if you want me even a little then why the fuck not?”

“I didn’t even know you liked boys,” Eliot admits, and Quentin gives him a weird look.

“You flirted with me _the second_ we met,” Quentin points out a little incredulously. 

Eliot shrugs, eyes flicking away from Quentin and then back because he doesn’t want to _see_ Quentin’s reaction but he can’t stop looking. “Well. Slutty, broken mess, like I said.”

“I’ve kissed guys before,” Quentin says, fingers going tight in the material of Eliot’s shirt, pulling him a little bit closer. “Haven’t done more than that, but– I mean. You can show me?”

That sends a sharp little zing of heat through Eliot’s body. But there’s literally like 4 other people less than 6 feet away, because they’re in an alley behind a shitty bar. “Do you want to go talk more or– not talk– somewhere that's not an alley that smells like cat piss?"

Quentin laughs, and then he's pushing up on his toes again, catching Eliot's lips before dropping back on his heels so Eliot had to bend a little to follow him, but it's so– his mouth tastes like menthols and bitter like the IPA he'd been drinking, and it feels so fucking good.

So maybe it actually starts like this:

Quentin, following him into his dorm room in the cottage, and the split second of uncertainty were Eliot’s not sure if they’re going to talk or fuck or Quentin’s going to change his mind and leave. Then Quentin’s kicking off his shoes and crawling to sit at the end of his bed, and it’s entirely natural because it’s _Quentin_. Quentin has studied here more times than Eliot has fingers to count, spent lazy Sundays reading while Eliot dozed off his hangovers. Fuck, in the last couple weeks, Quentin’s been in here almost as much as Eliot has, doggedly making sure Eliot wasn’t alone in his heartbreak.

Quentin’s leaning back on his hands, giving Eliot a frankly assessing look. “You look kind of like you wish you could Travel, right now,” Quentin observes, and it breaks the tension a little, lets Eliot shrug off his jacket and climb up onto the bed next Q, so their knees are touching. 

“I don’t,” he admits, reaching out to brush his knuckles against the curve of Quentin’s knee. “There’s nowhere else I want to be right now.”

He finds, as he says it, that it’s true. He wouldn’t trade this moment with Q for another chance with Mike, and that– shocks him, somehow. Quentin hums, a little closed-mouth smile living around his lips, the corners of his eyes, and he’s not– He could never be just a rebound. He was never going to be something fast and simple. 

“You should probably kiss me, then,” Quentin says, mildly, and well. Maybe he has a point. Maybe it’s time to stop overthinking.

Somehow he ends up with Quentin in his lap, which puts them at a perfect height for kissing, honestly, and Quentin’s so– kissing him is so _good_. He’s responsive, eager, kisses a little messy but god, he’s willing to follow where Eliot lead, and that’s. Eliot loves that, he honestly does, loves that he can cup Quentin’s jaw in his hands, and tilt his head just right, and slide his tongue into Quentin’s sweet hot mouth. 

A little sound, almost a moan, and Quentin’s rolling his hips in Eliot’s lap like he can’t help it, squirmy little thing. “Fuck,” Quentin breathes when Eliot breaks the kiss to help him tug his shirt off. “You’re really good at this.”

Eliot bites off _I’ve had a lot of practice_ , because, yeah, _that’s_ not sexy. Besides, well, it’s almost never this good, not really. “I don’t think I can take credit for this,” Eliot admits, trailing his nose down Quentin’s throat, breathing in his clean-boy smell. “Fuck, baby, I feel like I could kiss you for a week.”

Quentin makes a choked little sound, strangled and high-pitched when he says, “Okay, but like– Can we get our pants off first?” and then Eliot’s laughing, a bright peel of laughter he tries to hide against Quentin’s shoulder and just– fails utterly, because then Quentin’s laughing too, and the last of the awkwardness is melting away. 

They do get their pants off, and then Quentin climbs right back into Eliot’s lap like there’s nowhere else he wants to be tonight, reaching out to touch as Eliot kisses him and kisses him and _kisses him_. Kisses him until Quentin breaks away to watch his own hand travel down Eliot’s stomach, like he needs to see it when his fingers curl around Eliot’s cock.

“How do I say ‘you’re so big’ without sounding like I’m in a bad porno?” Quentin asks, and Eliot laughs again, feeling helium-light and sparkly. 

“If you figure it out, let me know,” he says into the space between their bodies, tipping his forehead onto Quentin’s so they can both watch Quentin’s sturdy square hand curling around the shaft of Eliot’s cock.

“I like how you feel,” Quentin breathes, his head resting against Eliot’s, exploring different ways to shift his grip until he finds something comfortable. Then his hand is moving, dragging pleasure up through Eliot’s veins, and it’s the weirdest, tenderest, most intimate handjob Eliot’s ever gotten. “Fuck, El, you feel really good. What do you like? Come on, show me.”

So he does, gets his hand around Quentin’s and adjusts the tightness of his grip, the speed of his strokes, rubs Quentin’s thumb up under the head with his own. That punches out a little grunt of pleasure, and Quentin responds eagerly, repeating the movement until Eliot moans. He seems fascinated by Eliot’s foreskin, rolling it down until the head peeks out, then back up, gently rubbing his thumb along the folded skin. Eliot lets him play, gets his own hand on Quentin’s dick instead, smaller and cut but such a good handful, satisfyingly hard and blood-warm against Eliot’s palm. And the _sound_ he makes, Jesus.

“That’s good, fuck,” Eliot pants, rolling his neck until he can get in for a kiss because fuck. _Fuck_. 

“I want–” Quentin breathes, free hand gripping Eliot’s shoulder like he might be _going somewhere_ , while Eliot gets his other arm around Quentin’s waist. “God, I want you in my mouth. I want to get my tongue right here.” He punctuates the words by rubbing his thumb against the fold of Eliot’s foreskin again, and _Jesus_. It doesn’t even sound like he’s trying to talk dirty, just like he can’t hold the want inside him anymore. It’s so hot, Eliot can’t think.

“Next time,” Eliot promises, because, god. He wants Quentin’s mouth on his dick, has spent literal _hours of his life_ fantasizing about that, and that was before Quentin was asking for it sounding hungry and sweet. But the idea of letting go, putting enough distance between them for that to happen, seems like torture right now. “God, baby, I want to– _teach you_ –”

“Yeah,” Quentin agrees, and Eliot can _feel_ his dick jerk, and god it’s satisfying to know Quentin would get off on that as much as Eliot would. “Show me how to– take it.”

Eliot surges up to kiss him, bite at his mouth until he moans. _God_ , it’s not fair, it’s not _fair_ that Quentin is everything he is everywhere else and then he’s like _this_ in bed: _exactly_ what Eliot wants. “ _Q_ ,” he moans, tightening his hand on Quentin’s cock, working until the sound of slickness and skin on skin fills the air. “Baby, I want to make you come.”

“You’re going to,” Quentin gets out, half a laugh, shifting his grip on Eliot’s dick so he’s not just playing with the foreskin anymore but stroking in earnest, and _fuck_ , it’s so good. 

It’s so good that Eliot comes first, with only a gasp of warning before pleasure pulls tight in his balls and expands outwards, his dick jerking and pulsing in Quentin’s hand. Q works him through it, kisses him through it, then kisses his still even after oversensitivity sets in and Eliot’s left shying away from Quentin’s hand.

But it means Eliot can focus, can actually give his full attention to the naked boy squirming in his lap. He’s barely had the brain power to pay attention to anything Quentin likes, but he tries to learn it now, listen to what makes Quentin gasp or moan, what he pushes in towards.

“Talk to me?” Quentin asks, panting hard and clinging to Eliot with both hands as Eliot works his dick. “I like your voice.”

“You’re so pretty, baby,” Eliot murmurs, dragging his nose against Quentin’s cheek, words tumbling out of him easily like it had been a struggle to hold them back. “I love how you feel in my lap, god, Q, it’s like you were made to be right here. Would you let me put my big cock inside you, baby? Hmm? I’d take my time, lick you nice and gentle and give you my fingers until you’re all open and sweet and wet and then just fit _right in_ –”

Quentin cries out, hands going tight on Eliot’s shoulders as he comes, and Eliot gets to _see_. Gets to watch up close, watch his brows pinch in surprise like he hadn’t been expecting it. Like he’s not used to feeling this good. Eliot watches it all, and then catches him when he goes a little limp, catches him and kisses him, slowly and sticky and sweet. They melt back onto the bed together, end up half on top of each other, kissing lazily around the tuts for cleaning spells, and it’s just– it’s just so fucking tender.

Eliot’s pretty sure he’s never been kissed like this before.

Fear sneaks up again once their skin begins to cool, Eliot's brain kicking into gear. He's far too sober to ignore the possible terrible ramifications of putting his dick in the high strung supernerd he's been fixating on for months. Even worse, there’s all the ways that screwing things up with _Quentin_ could wreck the few good things left in his life.

Quentin wriggles a little, pushing his face against Eliot's chest. It drags his stubble against Eliot's chest hair and he finds himself paralyzed, stuck between the desire to ask Quentin to stay and the desire to get away before what's left of his heart gets... shattered in to dust. It leaves him stiff, frozen, unable to respond as Quentin nose drags softly across the front of his chest, right over the point of pain in his heart. 

"Can I stay?" Quentin asks, quietly, and Eliot feels truly naked for the first time all night. Jesus, how does Quentin manage to be so fucking brave? 

Swallowing down all that fear, he tries to be brave like Q. "Please stay," he gets out, and feels Q smile against his skin, nuzzle against his chest hair to press a kiss to his sternum. Then Quentin rolls in his arms, tugging Eliot's arm around him until they're spooned together, tucked together back to chest. _God, he_ is _needy_ , Eliot thinks, dropping his head down to bury his nose in Quentin's hair. 

It feels so stupidly fucking good to be needed. To be wanted. Eliot pulls Quentin a little tighter against his chest, and slowly starts to let himself hope. 

**Author's Note:**

> I can be found as portraitofemmy on most places, but check me out on [twitter](https://twitter.com/portraitofemmy) and [tumblr](https://portraitofemmy.tumblr.com/). Thanks for reading!


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